Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
Welcome to this edition of Lifeline. A Beijing-born biochemist and her research team have unveiled
a new type of plastic bottle made partially from plants. The research team says the new
bottles reduce carbon emissions by up to 25% compared with traditional plastic. The bottles
are now being used by companies making beverages and ketchup in Shanghai. Our reporter Song
Wenjing has the story.
These plastic bottles look just like the bottles you see all the time in the supermarket. But
they are very different. Most plastic bottles are made from petroleum, and are usually non-recyclable,
but these ones are made from a blend of petroleum-based materials and up to 30% plant-based materials.
The bottles were made through a process that turns sugarcane and molasses - a byproduct
of sugar production - into a type of plastic. Huang Xiaoyan, the biochemist who led the
research team says they have been working on the project since 2006.
"There are compounds in the plants, and we convert natural compounds from the plants
to the monomers to make PET polymer. Because plants can absorb carbon dioxide from the
air when they grow, so we use the plant material and we can actually capture carbon dioxide
from the plant material in our bottle, and our bottle is 100% recyclable," said Shell
Huang.
The raw materials for the bottles cost about 10 percent more than traditional plastic.
But Huang says the bio-plastic bottles can be processed at existing manufacturing and
recycling facilities, so that cost difference can be digested through mass production. That
means consumers won't have to pay more for the bottles. One of the first companies to
put the plant-based bottles into use is Coca-Cola. The company says its Shanghai production line
has already started using them for its beverages. Meanwhile, US-based food giant Heinz says
it will also use bio-plastic for its ketchup bottles. And researchers say they are looking
for different bio-materials to make the bottles.
"We're doing research on many types of different plants, mainly for those cellulosic materials.
For example, like corn stover, rice straw, wheat straw, and sugar cane bagasse. All those
cellulosic materials that are waste today, and we're going to use those to make our bottles."
"Personally I prefer glass bottles because they are safer, and my husband and I often
give the plastic bottles to garbage collectors to recycle," said *** Yanhua.
Huang says her ultimate goal is a carbon-neutral bio-plastic bottle made 100 percent from agricultural
waste materials, and hopes to achieve that goal by the end of 2020.